Simple, Underrated Solutions to Your E-Commerce Questions

Simple, Underrated Solutions to Your E-Commerce Questions

These are some of the simplest and underutilized tactics that increase sales through a good, old-fashioned and honest exchange of information. In an age where all the information on the planet is available at your fingertips, your customers appreciate ease of use and personalization above all else. The old adage “it’s easier to keep a customer than create a new one” is still true. Instead of fretting over how many followers you have on Instagram or the number of likes your latest Facebook post received, make sure you’re covering these old-school fundamentals many new and small businesses fail to make a priority. This will set your company apart from the sea of startups and establish long-term relationships with customers that are also passionate advocates.

Inform Them

Customers don’t want to be told what they want. They want to discover it on their own! Leaving a trail of breadcrumbs when it comes to the heart and soul of your business is the best way to empower a sense of discovery. You’re not a big name brand yet, and that’s part of your appeal. Give them your backstory in easily digestible soundbites on social media, in addition to more comprehensive content on you blog (if you’re not blogging, you’re missing out on a one-of-a-kind connection with your customer base). You don’t even need to be a great writer. Remember that pictures are worth more than words these days, and video trumps pictures every time. An excellent blog post has a few pictures, a video and less than 300 words.

Empower Them

Not only do you want to tell the story of your brand, but you also want to establish your brand as being a leader in your industry. That means keeping up to date with what’s going on currently in the news, as well as tidbits of information you’ve amassed and want to share. You always want to be delivering value to your customers and potential customers without asking for anything in return.

Support Them

Now that you’ve developed brand advocates and empowered them, it’s time to give them what they want; your product! Imagine seeing a fashionable pair of sneakers in a commercial. Wow, those look awesome! You google the ad, seek out the brand, read reviews on them and even decide on the color you want. Then you see on their facebook page that they’re having free shipping all weekend! You click on the link only to be redirected to a website that’s impossible to use with your phone. The font is tiny, the buttons don’t work and there’s no way to enter your credit card number even if you wanted to. Which, at this point, you probably won’t. In fact, you’ll probably buy knock-offs from Amazon. The moral of the story: keep your website clean, ridiculously user-friendly and optimized for a broad range of mobile devices. If you don’t, you’re leaving a staggering amount of money on the table, or, in this case, in the shopping cart. Make sure that you’re sending out regular emails to a growing list of potential and past customers, along with those who have abandoned their shopping carts.